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- Nowadays when you take a stroll down the aisle
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at your local grocery store
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you'll notice that a lot of foods
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are labeled as Gluten free.
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In fact, in 2014,
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the U.S. sales of Gluten free labeled products
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was estimated to be about 23 billion dollars.
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So what exactly is Gluten
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and why is everybody talking about it?
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Well, from a biological standpoint
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Gluten is composed of two different proteins.
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There is gliadin which I'll represent as these blue circles.
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And there's glutenin
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which I'll represent as these red strings.
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These two together are going to form what's called gluten.
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Now gluten is the main protein composite
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of a lot of the grains that you eat.
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This includes things Wheat, Barley, and Rye.
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And this is really important because these are found
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in a lot of the foods that people typically eat.
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For example, you may see it in Bread, Pasta,
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Salad Dressings, and even Sausages.
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So this is just a handful of the many, many,
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many different types of foods that contains these grains.
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And by extension will contain the gluten.
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Now why is gluten important in healthcare?
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It's because there are three major conditions
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in which gluten can cause problems.
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The first is known as Celiac Disease.
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Celiac Disease is an Autoimmune Disease
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in which the body's own Immune System
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attacks the Small Intestine.
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It isn't exactly a new condition
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because it was first described in the Late 1800s.
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And in addition to that, it's actually quite rare.
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It affects about one for every 70 to 300 people
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depending on which country you live in.
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In the U.S. that's equivalent to about 2.1 million people.
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The second major condition is having an allergy
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to the grains that contain gluten.
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So much like how many people have allergies
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to things like peanuts or eggs
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a lot of people can have allergies to these grains.
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However, this is even less common than Celiac Disease.
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So if Celiac Disease and Grain Allergies
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are relatively rare, why is everybody talking about gluten?
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The reason is because of the third condition
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known as Gluten Intolerance.
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The idea behind Gluten Intolerance
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is that if you eat something containing gluten
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you'll experience all sorts of different symptoms
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associated with your bowels.
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This can include things like Diarrhea and Constipation
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and Cramping and Bloating as well.
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Now the whole phenomenon of Gluten Intolerance
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really began in 2011 when a paper was published
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in The American Journal of Gastroenterology.
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So right here I have the exact title of that paper
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which says, "Gluten causes gastrointestinal symptoms
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"in subjects without celiac disease."
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Basically, this paper concluded and I quote,
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"gluten is indeed a trigger of gut symptoms and tiredness."
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Thus began the Gluten free sensation.
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But in 2013, Dr. Peter Gibson
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who is the author of this study did a follow-up study.
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Now this is actually a pretty long title
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so I'm just going to read it off first
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and then we're going to digest it piece by piece.
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So it says, "No Effects of Gluten in Patients
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"With Self-Reported Non-Celiac Gluten Sensitivity
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"After Dietary Reduction of Fermentable, Poorly Absorbed,
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"Short-Chain Carbohydrates."
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So first we can focus on this part right over here
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this Fermentable, Poorly Absorbed,
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Short-Chain Carbohydrates.
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We have another word for this
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and it's really just an acronym
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it's simply known as FODMAPS.
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The words in this acronym are actually different
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from the words here but it's the same thing.
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Now these FODMAPS are basically just carbohydrates
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that are known to cause a lot of the symptoms
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that I mentioned earlier.
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The things like cramping, and diarrhea, and constipation.
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So this study basically considered the fact that maybe
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it's actually these FODMAPS instead of the gluten
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that's causing these symptoms.
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So they basically did mostly the same stuff
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as the earlier study except they removed these FODMAPS
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from the situation.
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It was kind of a confounding factor
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and they wanted to eliminate that.
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Then what they did was they put people
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on first, gluten filled diets.
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So I'll just label that as positive (+) gluten.
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And then they changed their diets to gluten free diets.
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So I'll just label that as minus (-) gluten.
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And they basically just wanted
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to look at the effects of this.
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So if the earlier hypothesis
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that gluten causes these symptoms is true
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then their symptoms should improve
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because you're putting them on a gluten free diet.
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However, they found that there were No Effects of Gluten.
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So gluten actually didn't do anything.
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It wasn't responsible for causing all of those symptoms.
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Now what does this all mean for us?
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Well, if you have Celiac Disease or Grain Allergies
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you should absolutely avoid consuming
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anything that contains Gluten in it.
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However, these conditions are pretty rare
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and they don't affect that many people.
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So for the rest of us,
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should we adopt this Gluten free diet?
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Well, it's true that these Gluten free diets
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do tend to be healthy.
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But that's not because they lack Gluten
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it's because by their very nature they're healthy.
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They don't contain all sorts of processed foods
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and carbohydrates.
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So because of that and not because they lack Gluten
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they are pretty healthy for you.
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So the jury is still kind of out
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on whether or not we should adopt a Gluten free diet.
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But the current scientific literature
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probably wouldn't support a Gluten free diet.